If Inexperienced Carnation had by no means returned from their mid-2000s hiatus, they’d nonetheless maintain a spot in steel historical past for delivering one of many style’s most bold single-epic releases, Gentle of Day, Day of Darkness. However that is not the way in which Inexperienced Carnation‘s story ended. As a substitute, the Norwegian progressive steel visionaries are again with their boldest artistic gamble but — a three-album saga 20 years within the making. The journey begins September 5, 2025, with A Darkish Poem, Half I: The Shores of Melancholia.
The title monitor, which premieres right now through Metallic Injection, blends timeless melody with heavy, aching reflection on the state of the fashionable world. It is a pure match for Inexperienced Carnation‘s sound, and as vocalist Kjetil Nordhus explains, “Melancholia is a spot that is suited Inexperienced Carnation from the very starting… this album is about shedding religion in what we have come to imagine in regards to the world.”
The music’s video paints that imaginative and prescient in vivid colours, juxtaposing hopeful imagery with undercurrents of dread. Nordhus sings with uncooked depth: “Ophelia / Too human, too gentle for this life” — a nod to Shakespeare’s tragic heroine. Keys and delicate acoustic guitars swirl beneath his voice, earlier than the monitor swells into crashing waves of double bass and guitar leads, like a vessel being carried into the unknown. The closing chorus, “One last breath / Below scarlet clouds”, lands like each an elegy and a rallying cry.
From a artistic standpoint, The Shores of Melancholia is a end result of threads operating all through the band’s 25-year historical past. Founding member Tchort, as soon as the bassist for Emperor, first conceived the thought of a trilogy shortly after Gentle of Day, Day of Darkness. That imaginative and prescient lingered for years, surviving hiatus and lineup shifts. Since reuniting in 2016, the band has intentionally pursued “extraordinarily bold” tasks, Nordhus stated, noting that this trilogy felt “simply out of our attain, which made us need to see if we might do it.”
Musically, The Shores of Melancholia attracts from throughout Inexperienced Carnation‘s stylistic palette. Opener “As Silence Took You” and “In Your Paradise” echo the melodic rock sensibilities of their Blessing in Disguise period, with large choruses and wealthy hooks. “Me My Enemy” provides a sluggish, bass-driven groove wrapped in spacey textures, whereas “The Slave That You Are” plunges into the band’s excessive steel roots with harsh visitor vocals from Enslaved‘s Grutle Kjellson. The title monitor carries the album’s conceptual weight, whereas nearer “Too Near the Flame” stretches practically 10 minutes, marrying progressive ambition with emotional immediacy.
Inexperienced Carnation bassist and songwriter Stein Roger Sordal explains the trilogy’s central focus: “A Darkish Poem is a set of songs that discover emotions of alienation… The primary half throws the listener into these questions from the beginning. If we hold them trapped inside every album, we’ll hold them trapped for the entire trilogy.”
Thematically, A Darkish Poem is not merely private melancholy — it is existential. In an early preview, Atmosfear Leisure described the work as aligning with “the grand, romantic custom of artistic sorrow,” connecting the band’s strategy to the despair of the Romantic poets, who mourned a fractured and unstable world.
Inexperienced Carnation‘s path up to now has been something however simple. After disbanding in 2007 following a troubled U.S. tour for Acoustic Verses, the band lay dormant for practically a decade. Their return at ProgPower USA 2016 was triumphant, and subsequent releases — together with 2020’s Leaves of Yesteryear — rekindled their popularity for mixing emotional depth with progressive complexity. Signing an bold multi-album take care of Season of Mist in 2017 gave them the platform to carry the trilogy to life.
Nordhus guarantees that ambition will carry over to the stay stage. Inexperienced Carnation will premiere The Shores of Melancholia in full at ProgPower USA later this 12 months and has a Bandcamp Listening Social gathering scheduled for August 20, giving followers an early style of the report. “We’re already working extraordinarily onerous on The Shores of Melancholia stay set, so we will likely be prepared,” Nordhus stated.
Pre-orders for A Darkish Poem, Half I: The Shores of Melancholia are out there right here.
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